Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Turkish troops, Russian killed in Syria
Eight soldiers die in campaign to oust Kurds; militants claim shoot-down of pilot
BEIRUT — Turkey said eight of its troops were killed Saturday in Ankara’s military operation against a Syrian Kurdish militia, the deadliest day in the 2-weekold offensive in the enclave of Afrin. In another part of Syria, al-Qaida-linked militants downed a Russian fighter jet, then shot and killed the pilot.
In a statement late Saturday, the Turkish military said five soldiers were killed when their tank in Syria came under attack near Afrin. The soldiers could not be saved despite all attempts, it said.
Earlier in the day, three Turkish soldiers were reported killed in the Afrin offensive — one was killed in the area of the tank attack, another in northern Syria and the third on the Turkish side of the border in what Ankara said was an
attack by Syrian Kurdish militiamen.
The death toll for Turkish troops since the operation started Jan. 20 now stands at 13.
Turkey opened the incursion into Afrin to rout the U.S.backed Syrian Kurdish militia, known as the People’s Protection Units, which it considers to be a terrorist organization and an extension of Kurdish insurgents fighting within Turkey.
From Istanbul, Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said Turkey will not tolerate the presence of the People’s Protection Units “anywhere” along its southern border, hinting that Ankara might expand the Afrin operation east. Turkey’s first demand is to see the People’s Protection Units move east of the Euphrates River and leave the town of Manbij, where American troops backing the Syrian Kurdish fighters are stationed, Kalin said.
He called on the United States to “disengage” from the People’s Protection Units and said Turkey will continue communications with “our American allies to avoid any confrontation.”
Meanwhile, in the embattled northwestern province of Idlib, al-Qaida-linked militants said they downed a Russian fighter jet and killed its pilot after he ejected and landed on the ground.
The pilot resisted being captured and fired at the militants, who then shot and killed him, according to the Russian Defense Ministry, militants and Syrian monitors.
The ministry confirmed the downing of the Su-25 and said the pilot was killed in fighting with “terrorists.” A report on the ministry’s Zvezda TV said preliminary information indicated the plane was shot by a portable ground-to-air missile in an area under control of al-Qaida’s branch in Syria.
The Britain- based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the plane was downed near the rebel-held town of Saraqeb, which Syrian troops have been trying to take under the cover of Russian airstrikes.
The Levant Liberation Committee, a powerful rebel alliance that publicly split from al-Qaida last year, said it had used a man-portable anti-aircraft system to shoot down the jet as it flew low over Saraqeb.
A Syrian militant in the area said the Russian pilot was shot and killed when he resisted capture. The pilot opened fire from his pistol as the militants were trying to seize him, said the militant, who refused to be identified by his real name because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
The incident could raise tensions between Russia and Turkey, which is monitoring a so-called de-escalation zone in Idlib as part of an agreement made during Syrian peace talks in the Kazakh capital, Astana.
The two countries have improved ties and cooperated in Syria in recent months, but relations hit an all-time low in 2015, when Turkey, a longtime supporter of the country’s rebels, also shot down a Russian warplane inside Syria.
Turkey set up observation points in Idlib last year, ostensibly to monitor the fighting between the rebels and government forces, but it has also been accused of fostering closer ties with the Levant Liberation Committee.
Russia is a key ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad, and has been waging a military campaign on behalf of his forces since 2015. Since then, Syrian troops have captured wide parts of the country and in recent weeks have been making advances in Idlib.
It also raises questions about the source of the anti-aircraft system, a weapon for which Syria’s rebels have repeatedly pleaded from their international backers. The United States in particular has been strongly opposed, fearing that anti-aircraft weapons could fall into the hands of the country’s extremist groups.
State Department spokesman Heather Nauert said any allegation that the United States has provided such missiles in Syria was untrue, and she denied that U.S. equipment was used in shooting down the Russian plane.
“The United States has never provided Manpad missiles to any group in Syria, and we are deeply concerned that such weapons are being used,” she said, using an abbreviation for man-portable air-defense missiles.
AIRSTRIKES IN IDLIB
Earlier in the day, the Observatory and the media arm of the Levant Liberation Committee reported intense airstrikes in Idlib. The Observatory reported more than 35 airstrikes on Saraqeb since late Friday, adding that many residents are fleeing.
The White Helmets civil-defense group said Saturday that seven civilians had been killed in at least 25 strikes on largely residential areas, some of them using barrel bombs.
In the hours after the Russian jet was downed, Moscow claimed to have killed more than 30 militants in the area, Interfax reported. The agency quoted the Defense Ministry as saying it used “precision-guided weapons” to carry out the strike, but without giving details.
The Ibaa News Agency of the Levant Liberation Committee said Russian and Syrian warplanes and helicopter gunships had been pounding Saraqeb and the village of Tel Mardeekh in Idlib since the early hours of Saturday.
The agency later quoted militant commander Mahmoud al-Turkmani as saying that anti- aircraft weapons were sent to al-Qaida’s fighters in the Saraqeb area after airstrikes intensified last week. He warned that Russian warplanes would not pass through Syrian airspace without “paying a price.”
After the plane’s downing, the agency quoted him as saying: “That is the least revenge we can offer to our people and those occupiers should know that our sky is not a picnic.”
The state-run Syrian Arab News Agency said Syrian troops captured the village of Maasaran as well as the Tel Tokan hill, cutting links between Saraqeb and the rebel stronghold of Maarest al-Numan to the south.
Syrian government forces and their allies began a push into Idlib six weeks ago, inching closer to a key highway that connects Syria’s two largest cities, Damascus and Aleppo.
The United Nations says more than 270,000 people have been displaced in Idlib because of the government onslaught since Dec. 15. Idlib province is also home to more than 1 million displaced people from around Syria.
Also Saturday, Syria’s Foreign Ministry has dismissed as “null and void” U.S. accusations that Assad’s government is producing and using “new kinds of weapons” to deliver deadly chemicals despite committing to abolish its program in 2013.
The American statements are “nothing more than lies” based on accounts of what President Donald Trump’s administration called its partners on the ground, the ministry said. It also said reports by Western-backed media outlets about Damascus using chemical weapons were “a new version of U.S. and Western desperate intentions to create” excuses to attack Syria.
Information for this article was contributed by Bassem Mroue, Zeynep Bilginsoy, Jim Heintz and Albert Aji of The Associated Press; and by Erin Cunningham, Louisa Loveluck and Andrew Roth of The Washington Post.